The film The Maltese Falcon is a classic black and white movie containing many different genre conventions. This film displays varying aspects of the male as well as the female character. In this movie we can see how femininity is portrayed in contrast to masculinity. This film explores ideas of the detective genre, by having the main character Sam Spade, take us through many mysteries awaiting to be discover. The constant mystery of “who did it” that surrounded the movie made it very interesting and intriguing to the point where I had forgotten that I was watching a black and white film.

Sam Spade the main male character is portrayed as a smart, sneaky, and clever. He is seen in my eyes as the character that people usually sympathize with and cheers for, in other words he is the hero of the story.
In the other hand Brigid, the female lead is portrayed as a deceitful, selfish woman who pretends to be weak and hopeless to get her way. She likes to play games and manipulate the male characters (mainly Sam).
Effie, Sam’s assistant is portrayed as a strong female character because she’s often surrounded by males.
Iva who was Miles wife was portrayed as I would called “the classic female character” of the 20’s-40’s. She’s beautiful, lady like and weak.

One thing I noticed about the film is that the female characters are constantly being distracted by the male characters.